House Intelligence Panel Wraps Up Russia Probe Interviews

Justin Bates |Tuesday, March 13, 2018

Republicans Are Ending House Russia Probe Over Democrats' Objections

Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee have completed a draft report concluding there was no collusion or coordination between Donald Trump's presidential campaign and Russian Federation, a finding that has enraged Democrats on the panel but is sure to please the White House.

US Republicans on a House panel have found no evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin in the US 2016 presidential election.

Conaway accused Democrats of seeking to prolong the probe ahead of the mid-term elections. "We found perhaps some bad judgment, inappropriate meeting", said Michael Conaway, the Republican congressman who led the probe.

"We found no evidence of collusion", Conaway said.

House committee Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif., was set to send the majority's draft of the report to Democrats on Tuesday for their review.

LUCAS: The other big investigation on the Hill of course is the Senate Intelligence Committee, and that remains on track. GOP members say they've seen no conclusive evidence of "collusion" between Trump campaign officials and the Russian government.

However, he also justified ending the committee's investigation.

"The bottom line: The Russians did commit active measures against our election in '16, and we think they will do that in the future".

The committee will interview no more witnesses and Republicans are in the process of preparing their final report, Rep. Mike Conaway (R-Texas) told reporters.

In contradicting the intelligence agencies, the GOP's 150-page report finds that Russians meant to "sow discord", faulted a "lackluster" effort by the Obama administration to combat Russian cyber activities, and raised questions about contacts between members of the intelligence community and the media.

Their conclusion - which matches Trump's own view on election meddling - will likely differ from the opinion held by their Democratic counterparts.

This is something that Democrats have complained about with the Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee.

Despite Trump's constant denial that he ever had anything to do with the reported hacking, several well-respected news sources and government agencies have stood by their reporting of Russian Federation hacking into the election with the goal of electing Trump.

That finding squares with Trump's view that the Russian Federation story is nothing but a hoax and a witch hunt designed by Clinton sympathizers to explain the Democratic nominee's shock election defeat in 2016.

Mr. Conaway said the panel interviewed more than 70 witnesses and reviewed more than 300,000 pages of documents.

Democrats also sought subpoenas for the committee's last two witnesses, outgoing White House communications director Hope Hicks and former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, but Republicans did not issue them.

Republicans also highlighted what they call the real problems within the Russian Federation matter, including what they say was the abuse of surveillance powers by national security officials and what they called "problematic contacts between senior intelligence community officials and the media".

The Republican decision to end the House Russia investigation comes as special counsel Robert Mueller's probe appears to be accelerating.

The Intelligence Committee did find, however, that Russian Federation took active measures to meddle in the 2016 election, and that the majority expects it to undertake similar measures again.

It will include at least 25 recommendations, including how to improve election security, respond to cyberattacks and improve counterintelligence efforts.

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